Stop Edge from taking control of PDF's permanently!!!

... how can I permanently set Adobe as the default program for PDFs?

With difficulty.

This widespread problem - the default PDF handler eventually reverts to Edge - is not caused by anything within Edge. It is a Windows function over which the Edge engineers have no control. Nevertheless, I'm told that the Edge team are working with Windows to find a resolution, but there is none in sight at present.

For what it's worth, my understanding of the dilemma is that Windows is committed to User choice in respect of default applications. Adobe, on the other hand, makes tools available to admins to enable them to compel users to use their products exclusively and confound user choice. These policies are obviously incompatible.

Perhaps there needs to be a two-tier system: one for home users with the current user choice protection and another for enterprise users with managed devices, where admins can specify which third-party software can or should be used. After all, many companies already dictate which browser employees are to use, and Mozilla has devised a mechanism for bypassing the user choice limitations to ensure that Firefox remains the default permanently. There are thus several ways out of the dilemma, and it's now up to the devs to settle on an acceptable one. Meanwhile, affected users and their admins just have to be patient. When a solution is found and deployed for testing, it will be announced at the TechCommunity site.

Because there's nothing further to be added to this discussion at this stage, and because it's attracting unhelpful responses, it is now locked. Anyone wishing to add something new is encouraged to start a new one using the option on the Participate menu at the top of every page at this site.

'The complaints on this have gradually tapered off over the past five years'

Because nothing ever gets done. People give up. FIVE YEARS this issue has been going on, and still no resolution. This particular thread is coming to 11 months on it's own. What happens to cause this has been identified, how about providing a solution where this specific process can be disabled? How about when you manually set a program as default, that becomes the default in the process instead of it being Edge? I'm not a programmer so I don't know how much work would be involved in this, but it seems like it would be an actual solution instead of ignoring a FIVE YEAR PROBLEM that has existed since Win 10 / Edge was released.

Agreed MonroeMullinix! I have had to switch the pdf default 2 times back to Adobe just this week. There are 1000's of complaints (business and consumer) on-line dating back to the introduction of Windows 10 on this issue. There are 39 replies to just this post. Everyone, Microsoft is playing us here and could care less about these post and complaints and they no longer answer their phones. This is clearly a Government Antitrust and Unfair Competitiveness issue that needs to be remedied by the FTC. Is there anyone out there that has experience filing a complaint with the FTC? I will look into and any assistance would be greatly appreciated. Thanks, -Todd

[ADMIN EDIT: Please remember to be respectful to others in this community.] My company (which employs several former Microsoft devs) has had to spend tens of thousands of dollars to combat this issue. Microsoft AGGRESSIVELY tries to make its own apps the default for everything. And they AGGRESSIVELY develop schemes to change the ways users can access these settings, making them more difficult to find for most average users, who will either give up or pay a professional to fix it.

The above-mentioned "User Choice" was actually designed to create a conflict with any external app. By putting it in the registry, they are actually taking away user choice.

The "Edge resets the "User Choice" reg entry every time it updates... which is at least weekly. There have been numerous articles about the internal Microsoft discussions on this issue. Emails and memos have been leaked. They are caught red-handed. [ADMIN EDIT: Please remember to be respectful to others in this community.]

Tried several methods posted online 5+ times on different macines and never sticks. The Edge updates seem to always reset. If you have something that is working I would greatly appreciate a link or instructions. Thanks, -Todd